


cotton candy skies

by teeceecee



Series: pink and blue skies (oh, you and i) [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Allura is a pining mess, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Healthy Relationships, Lance (Voltron) is a Dork, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-12
Updated: 2017-09-19
Packaged: 2018-12-27 02:09:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12071484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teeceecee/pseuds/teeceecee
Summary: It starts as it always does; with one singular moment that embeds itself in the mind, a change of currents that freezes in the memories of two people on the verge of realizing that they mean more to the other than they expected.For Allura, it's a piece of paper written in loopy handwriting, childish and plain in its intent, yet the words imprinted on it were anything but.'Do you wanna be friends?'For Lance, it's when he catches her in his arms.





	1. an outreach

**Author's Note:**

> pumped up from an allurance high, welcome young ones to my new fic.
> 
> proceed with caution, i'm in a cotton candy mood.

listen to:

cotton candy sky - tokio hotel

love like this (acoustic version) - kodaline 

* * *

 

She doesn’t know when it all starts, but she realizes she seeks him out more often now.

There are days when she will have trouble with Blue and he’s the only one who knows how to soothe the huge mechanical lion. Allura silently despairs; she knows that as the last Princess of Althea, she must portray strength.

She must let fear be her guide.

And yet, when she sees how Lance smiles at Blue with a fragile edge, almost as if his smile could fracture at any minute, she doesn’t know if fear is the answer. Lance croons a shallow pick-up line that has her smiling, internally rolling her eyes and jotting it down should she ever need it to persuade Blue.

“Hey Blue, are you from outer space? Cause your body is out of this world!”

She has to laugh. His facial expressions cap the flirtatious tone, and his wiggling eyebrows ignite a fit of giggles she barely smothers with her palm.

He turns to her, quirking a smile. “What’s so funny, Princess?”

She regains her stoic exterior and shakes her head. “Nothing, Lance.”

Lance lights up at her mirthful gaze, and he smirks. “Wait, you do find my pick-up lines funny. Do they work?”

Allura clasps her hands together in her front, forcing a polite smile. “Not really, Lance. But you could always try harder.”

That answer seems to satisfy him, and he hums. “Whenever I need to bond with Blue, all I do is take a rag and wipe her down. She loves the attention.” He picks a rag from the ground, and Allura notices how long his fingers are. She marvels at the pretty shape of his fingernails, how the curve of his palm is almost feminine as he dips the rag in a bucket of water. Lance murmurs something under his breath that she recognizes as his mother tongue and proceeds to wipe Blue’s nose, lost in the motions.

The Lion remains pliant, and he breathes a laugh, looking peaceful as he shines the tip of Blue’s nose, and she blurts out her thoughts before she has a chance to rein them in.

“How do you do it?”

Lance stills, turning to her, and he blinks slowly, like a startled klanmuirl. “Do what?”

Allura is at a loss for words. She doesn’t know how to articulate her thoughts; she isn’t like Shiro, who can voice his opinion in a diplomatic and reasonable way. Her methods are brasher, and she prefers force over diplomacy. She could never stay sane long enough during embassy visits to different planets, all with unpronounceable names in a whirlwind of colors and cultures that leave a pressing ache behind her eyes.  

She bulldozes past her hesitation, deciding that maybe Lance would understand. “Bond with Blue,” she admits, “how do you do it? How do you bond with her when I’m her pilot?”

Lance gives her a smile, and she’s thrown off centre once more. Allura rights her axis, tilting back her world on a straight track as she pretends that Lance’s blue eyes doesn’t send tremors through her core. She’s pining, and she’s a pining mess.

He runs a hand through his brown locks, and she has to resist following the motions of his hand with her eyes. Allura doesn’t know what’s gotten into her, but it can’t be any good. Her feelings for Lance were just as they are; feelings with nothing to sustain them beyond a foolish glimmer of hope. After the way how they started, there should be no way Lance was still infatuated with her.

The current Red Paladin still flirts with her at any given chance he could take, but it’s a new, unfamiliar vein. There’s no longer the lewd implications in his words, as she's apt to decipher. There’s instead, a gentler tone, almost familial in nature, but she knows the way that Lance looks at her is distinguishable from a family member. No one related by blood would look at her with such devotion in his eyes.

“It’s easy,” he says, and pats the Lion’s muzzle. “Blue’s a lot like a Mom. She wants what’s best for you. Treat her like a friend and you should be fine.”

“A…friend,” Allura tests the words in her mouth.

“What—you’ve never had any friends before, Princess?”

He means it in a teasing way, but she can’t help the sadness that eclipses her mind. Her memories latch onto the people she’s lost and she begs the tears not to fall, barely stemming the moisture misting her eyes.

“H-Hey,” Lance’s voice cracks as he takes in her dim disposition. Allura’s sure she looks like a dying ember; she can feel her markings throbbing, a response to her grief.

“Don’t worry about me,” she says, adopting a faint smile. “I’m sorry, Lance. I just got…caught up in memories.”

Lance sets the rag on the floor, and approaches her. She steadies her gaze and unclasps her hands. Her face is too hot and she mentally berates herself for such a reaction. The last thing she wanted was the Red Paladin to comfort her. Allura knows that a line would be crossed once that happens, and she so desperately wants to keep the boundaries clean.

“Hey, I didn’t mean what I said, ‘Llura. Don’t take some of the things I said to heart,” he says with a measure of self-disapproval.

“It’s not you, Lance,” she quickly smooths the situation over. “It’s just…sometimes—”

She cuts off, putting a clamp to her emotions.

“Sometimes?” he prompts.

She unglues her limbs and gives a delicate shake of her head. “I have to go.”

Lance furrows his brow, but he doesn’t stop her from leaving the hangar. She feels his stare burning holes into her back, but she doesn’t turn around, rushing from the stifling waters of Lance’s blue eyes.

_Is this what an ocean feels like?_

She’s heard his rants on water, about how he misses the droplets falling upon his skin, soaking his hair as loses himself underneath its waves. Allura wonders if he’s her ocean. She’s never seen one before, but if she could put a feeling on it, it would be how Lance’s eyes drag her to its darkest trenches, and a part of her refuses to resurface.

She goes about her day as usual, until night falls and she retreats into the sanctuary of her bedroom. Allura tucks her knees under her body, pulling the covers to her chin as her mice friends chitter at her feet. She bends down to bring them up to her bed, when a rustling from the other side of the door sends a red alert through her system.

She creeps down from the plush mattress, inching towards the door, ready to attack whoever dared to disturb her peace. A soft shuffling sounded from the end, and from the corner of her eye, she notices a piece of paper sliding underneath the crack of her door. The sounds disappear down the hallway and Allura cautiously straightens. She picks the paper and unfurls it, the cleft between her brows disappearing as Lance’s familiar, loopy writing jumps from the page.

_‘I know you don’t want to talk about it, but it occurred to me (as it always does when it’s too late—sorry, Princess) that you may be missing your friends from before. I understand where you’re coming from. So, I have a preposition. Onward to the next page, ‘Llura!’_

Allura did as his writing instructed, and a soft laugh escapes her lips.

_‘Do you wanna be friends?’_

 

 

 


	2. like fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance replies to Allura's letter, and Keith finds out about his thing Thing™ for Allura.

listen to: 

high without your love - loote

* * *

 

Lance rubs his eyes as he tightens his fingers around the piece of paper with her writing on it. His heart involuntarily skips a beat and he doesn’t try to chastise himself. There’s no need to. He knows what he feels for Allura is inexplicably…unexplainable. Sure, she’s a pretty Princess, and she can kick his behind to the next nebula. But she’s Allura.

Perfect, composed, beautiful Allura. She’s like fire, and trifling with the likes of a fire was sure to leave him – unsurprisingly – burnt.

He unfurls the paper, and scans her words. His heart skips a beat once more, and he’s sure that his appendage is on the verge of exploding. Lance is so nervous.

Sure, he made the first step towards friendship (and he means it—he wants nothing more than a simple friendship) but just the thought of her rejection…

Lance swallows thickly, allowing himself a reprieve as he breathes in deeply. There will be no love lost if she rejects his offer. He should’ve known better.

He unfurls the paper with shaky fingers, and nearly drops it when he reads her reply.

‘ _Yes. I could use a friend right now. And Lance, it’s not your fault. I’m ready to put the past behind if you are as well._ ’

He exhales a jubilant breath as he grins, her words a warm surprise. Lance needs to sit as he pens his reply, and he does it with a trembling disposition.

‘ _I’m ready._ ’

*

What proceeds next is a reaction he never anticipates precipitating between Allura and him. After the initial awkwardness that comes with leaving letters through doors, they blush and moved on with a coherence that seemed almost natural. Allura found him charming and he found her a good listener; their relationship blossomed beyond what neither of them expected.

Lance would help her with Blue, and she in turn would teach him special Althean defence moves to increase his repertoire against Keith. The newly minted Black Paladin didn’t know what hit him when Lance executed a flip that left Keith on his back and Allura cheering loudly from the side-lines.

“That’s it, Lance!” she cries, running towards him and helping him up. Lance grins, chest puffing in shy pride as he extends his hand to Keith. The man in question accepts his proffered hand, studying Allura’s victorious grin, and says nothing, merely lifting a brow. Lance colours, and silently wonders how Keith manages to throw in his surprise, disbelief and disdain all in one look.

“That flip was perfect,” Allura gushes, and he chuckles.

“Couldn’t have done it without your help,” Lance offers with a self-decrepitating shrug.

Allura scoffs. “Don’t be so humble. You would’ve gotten it even without my guidance.”

Behind him, Keith chokes on his own breath. Lance decides to give his rival something to gawk about as he says, “I can teach you some other moves, as well, Princess.” He means it to come off as seductive, but it’s Allura, and the meaning slides off her pretty shoulders with nonchalant ease.

“I would love that, Lance! I can’t wait to see what other Earthen styles I could use to compliment my own.”

Lance winces, and feels Keith’s smirk on his open back.

“S-Sure, Princess.”

She gives him a slight smile and leaves the training deck. Lance turns on Keith before he can utter a word.

“It’s not what you think.”

The Black Paladin’s jaw ticks, and his violet eyes shine with a subdue glint of satisfaction at his panic. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Her,” Lance says, and struggles to keep his blush down. Keith notes it (as he always does) and studies his face.

“What is going on with you two?” he asks, and there’s a hint of exasperation in his tone.

“Everything’s going on with the both of us,” Lance groans and settles on the floor. He ignores the smudges their boots scuff on the ground and concentrates on his stewing helplessness.

Keith shifts his weight from one foot to another, and there’s a ripe scent of indecisiveness in the air, before he concedes and seats himself on the ground next to Lance. “Look,” he starts, “I don’t know what’s between you and the Princess, but I can tell you’re not exactly happy about it.”

“Took you a while,” Lance swears swiftly under his breath.

Keith knits his brows together, and pretends not to hear the sarcasm. He wonders why he even decided to ask Lance if he was going to be this difficult. He makes to stand, to leave the new Red Paladin to his silence when Lance breaks the silence with a soft sigh.

“I think I’m…I think I have a crush on Allura.”

Lance registers the confusion on Keith’s face and makes an inquiring sound in the back of his throat.

Keith, realizing that he’s been noticed, narrows his eyes in confusion. “Didn’t you always have a thing for her?”

“Yeah, but now it’s a thing Thing.”

“Thing…thing?”

“C’mon, Keith!” Lance exasperates.

“No, no,” Keith reassures, though his tone is anything but. “I thought you always had a…you know…a thing for her.”

“That was before.”

“So…do you or do you not have a thing—”

“I don’t know,” Lance says, quieter this time. “It’s the same as it was before. Whenever I look at her, my heart skips and I feel like my stomach could explode from my body cause of all the butterflies.”

Keith nods emphatically. “Gross. But, okay.”

“And whenever she smiles, it’s…it’s different, Keith. I can’t explain it.”

The two boys sat in the hollow silence, staring at their own feet. Lance stood, breaking the quiet, and Keith was hard-pressed to ask him to continue. Lance’s love life was his own, and the new Black Paladin had no right to interfere with it.

Lance leaves with a sharp nod, and Keith internally shakes his head at the absurdity of it all.

He doesn’t have much experience with relationships, but what Lance seems to be going through sounds more like pining to him. Keith can’t decide if Allura feels the same as him, and somehow, he wonders how Shiro would react if he knew how his team has developed. An echoing pang resounds in the cavity of his chest at the reminder of Shiro and he stands, swallowing a sigh as he pushes the emotions behind a hard brick layer.

He can’t think of his lost brother now. Keith knows that he would have to face his own demons one day, his insecurities and deep scarring that Shiro’s loss seemed to have left on his psyche.

Today, was not the day.

**Author's Note:**

> find me @klancingdream where i'm trash for anything allurance related


End file.
